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Why is Magento a Superior Option to Opencart?

According to a 2012 report from Alexa, Magento is the most popular eCommerce solution in the world today. Opencart, on the other hand, pales in terms of popularity. This doesn’t automatically mean you can discount it, though. Popularity isn’t a measure of whether something will work for you.

Let’s take a look at some of the reasons why you as a business owner might find Magento a better option for your business.

Origins

One of the main reasons Magento instils more confidence in its users is because it was started by a group of open source developers back in 2008. This means more than you think. It means the people behind the platform are retailers just like you. They wanted to form a better eCommerce solution.

Opencart, on the other hand, is a newer addition to the industry. It was started by Daniel Kerr in 2010. From a consumer friendly standpoint, Magento is already way ahead of Opencart.

Development Freedom

Magento allows a practically infinite amount of freedom in the way you can change the way your shopping cart looks. Opencart comes with a lot of restrictions. This is mainly due to the way the database retrieves information. It restricts you heavily.

For example, you can’t give out free eBooks on Opencart because it messes around with the payment system. If a customer attempts to buy a free eBook, they won’t be able to go past the payment window due to the fact no value has been entered. This already alienates a vast number of industries, including consultancy, IT services, and publishing.

Incorporation

Opencart doesn’t allow you to incorporate anything into it. Again, this is one of the drawbacks of the way the platform has been designed.

Despite them both being open source, Magento already comes with options to integrate a number of popular platforms into the system. These include PayPal, eBay, RedLaser, and GSI Commerce.

Entrepreneurs that have already operated on these platforms will find it much easier to make the switch to Magento than they would with Opencart.

SEO Considerations

Magento has long been known as an ideal eCommerce solution for SEO purposes. Opencart doesn’t offer the same level of flexibility and customisation. People have complained about the fact there’s no facility for entering a custom URL.

You have these capabilities with Magento. If you want to use a Magento extension, you can go further and customize the template and manipulate it for better SEO. Furthermore, it’s simple to link your new store with Google products like Google AdWords and Google Analytics.

Getting Started

There are around 9,000 extensions for Opencart. On the other hand, there are only 1,500 extensions for Magento. At first glance, this seems like a drawback, but it’s not. Opencart starts in flat-pack form. You can’t just download the platform and begin setting up your store. You have to pay for additional extensions to get started.

Many of the extensions you have to download and install separately with Opencart have already been added for Magento.

Beginners will find working with this platform much easier. There are fewer prerequisites for getting started and more support through the community. Magento has the biggest community through social media and through Google.

According to Web Hosting Net, Magento has 33,000 Twitter followers to less than a thousand for Opencart, 7,000 Facebook fans to less than a thousand for Opencart, and over 43 million Google searches compared to just under 11 million Google searches for Opencart.

The differences are enormous, and it demonstrates the differences in popularity between the two. With the larger community and the superior flexibility, there’s really only one winner when putting these two platforms up against each other.